Tag: crime

Juneteenth celebrations marred by gun violence that killed 7 people and injured 21

Days after President Joe Biden signed a bill recognising Juneteenth as a federal holiday, the country recorded a spate of gun violence across different states during its celebration over the weekend.

Violent incidents related to Juneteenth were reported in California, South Carolina, Michigan and Colorado, while Louisiana and Philadelphia recorded unrelated incidents of shooting. In all, at least seven people were killed and 21 injured in gun violence over the weekend.

The shooting in Oakland, California occurred around 6.30pm about a mile from Lake Merritt Amphitheater where hundreds had gathered throughout the day to commemorate 19 June, 1865, as the day when roughly 2,000 Union Army soldiers landed at Galveston, Texas, with news that enslaved African Americans were now free.- ADVERTISEMENT –

According to CBS News, at least six people were wounded and one person died in the shooting. Soon after, police arrested two men and recovered two firearms. They were arrested after the officials saw them running away from the scene after the shooting, reported the media outlets.

It was not the only incidence of violence recorded on the day relating to Juneteenth. In Colorado, at least one person was killed and four wounded in a mass shooting incident that happened in the parking lot of a strip mall located at 12455 E Mississippi Avenue. The gathering was “related to a Juneteenth celebration” said police in a statement, adding that at least 50 people called 911 to report an “active shooter in the shopping mall parking lot.”

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Florida Man Hit With Felony Charges For Leaving Tire Tracks on LGBT Crosswalk

A Florida man was hit with felony charges after leaving tire tracks on an LGBT crosswalk, with activists attempting to get authorities to elevate the charges to include “defacing a memorial.”

“Alexander Jerich, 20, turned himself in to police in Delray Beach, Florida, on Thursday,” reports RT. “Jerich was seen on Monday allegedly pulling onto the intersection in a pickup truck and spinning his rear tires for around 15 seconds, leaving black streaks across the rainbow stripes and sending clouds of smoke into the air.”

The charges against Jerich were elevated from misdemeanor to felony after authorities said there was “evidence of prejudice” in his actions.

However, this isn’t enough for LGBT activists, who are trying to make police hit Jerich with charges of “defacing a memorial” under a law passed by Governor Ron DeSantis in April that was intended to protect actual statues and memorials from being torn down by left-wing hate mobs.

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Charges dropped for hundreds of alleged looters in New York City

In late May and early June 2020, looters smashed storefronts in the Bronx and Manhattan boroughs of New York City.

Many were caught on tape, some with their faces visible. Others even posted their own videos of their actions those nights on social media. Hundreds were arrested.

But a review of NYPD data by the investigative team at WNBC, the NBC owned station in New York, shows that a large percentage of the cases — particularly in the Bronx — were dismissed, and that many convictions were for counts like trespassing that carry no jail time.

“I was in total shock that everything is being brushed off to the side,” said Jessica Betancourt, who owns an eyeglass shop that was looted and destroyed along Burnside Avenue in the Bronx last June.

According to the data, 118 arrests were made in the Bronx during the worst of the looting in early June.

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The U.S. Military Doesn’t Even Track How Many Weapons It Loses, And It Has Lost Thousands

Adamning investigative report published by The Associated Press today details how over 2,000 weapons have gone missing from military arsenals between 2010 and 2019. While the data set was far from complete, what the outlet did obtain shows a worrying pattern of lost and stolen weapons, some of which ended up in the hands of criminals who used them in the commission of violent crimes, while others were even simply discarded in public parks.

The Associated Press‘s investigation states that, between 2010 and 2019, these weapons went missing or were deliberately taken from a wide variety of locations, including armories, warehouses, firing ranges, Navy vessels, or even while in transit. Reasons cited in the report included unlocked doors, burglary, security personnel falling asleep, or lapses in surveillance and other security systems. 1,504 weapons were reported missing or stolen from the Army, 211 from the Navy, 204 from the Marines, and 39 were categorized as “Other,” which presumably includes the U.S. Coast Guard and Department of Defense security forces like the Pentagon Force Protection Agency.

While the Marines and Navy offered their own figures about weapons lost or stolen throughout the last decade, the Army and Air Force did not willingly provide The Associated Press with exact numbers about how many of their weapons were unaccounted for, so the report instead relied on Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests for military criminal case files, as well as internal military small arms registries. One of those FOIA requests filed with the Army’s Office of the Provost Marshal General revealed 1,303 lost firearms from the Army alone. The AP reported the Air Force was less cooperative:

The Air Force was the only service branch not to release data. It first responded to several Freedom of Information Act requests by saying no records existed. Air Force representatives then said they would not provide details until yet another FOIA request, filed 1.5 years ago, was fully processed.

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Former Republican Lawmaker Shot Dead

A former Republican Mississippi lawmaker was found, shot dead, outside the burned home where her sister-in-law’s  body was found in December.

The former lawmaker, Ashley Henley, was shot in the back of the head as she was believed to be mowing her lawn, The Daily Mail reported.

The 40-year-old’s sister-in-law Kristina Michelle Jones was found dead in a burnt out trailer at the property in rural Yalobusha County, about 70 miles south of DeSoto County, in December last year, and Henley and her husband Brandon were convinced she was murdered.

Henley was at the property – where the couple have erected a large sign with pictures of Jones picture saying ‘I was Murdered’ as part of their campaign – on Sunday when she was killed.

Her body was found at about 10pm. She leaves behind a 15-year-old son.

Police have not formally linked the two deaths but Brandon Henley said he believed his sister and wife may have been killed by the same person. 

“’I feel that if something would have been done sooner this would have never happened,” he said to WJTV.

“I’d like for [the police] to do their job because this is the second person someone down there has taken from me. My son doesn’t have a mother,” he said.

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Columbus police say weekend shooting spree was racially motivated

The 39-year-old man charged in a weekend shooting spree told Columbus police his assaults were racially motivated, targeting white men he felt had taken from him all his life, a detective testified Monday.

Though police allege Justin Tyran Roberts was involved in three separate assaults that wounded five people Friday and Saturday in Columbus and Phenix City, he was in Columbus Recorder’s Court to face charges in just one of those incidents, a shooting around 2 p.m. Saturday under the Oglethorpe Bridge at Broadway and Fourth Street.

That’s where a man was shot in the back as he was getting into his vehicle in a parking area under the bridge, said Detective Brandon Lockhart, who quoted Roberts as telling police, “I had to have him.”

The victim was hit once in the back, but four bullets hit his vehicle, and police found six shell casings at the scene, Lockhart said.

Under questioning by public defender Robin King, Lockhart elaborated on what Roberts, who is Black, told him during an interview at police headquarters.

“Basically, he explained throughout his life, specifically white males had taken from him, and also what he described as ‘military-looking white males’ had taken from him,” the investigator said.

Roberts also claimed that such men were “shooting at him in a wooded area with a slingshot,” and the wounds had infected his skin, Lockhart testified. Police saw no injuries to substantiate that, he said.

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US Military Guns Keep Vanishing. Some Are Later Used in Street Crimes

In the first public accounting of its kind in decades, an Associated Press investigation has found that at least 1,900 U.S. military firearms were lost or stolen during the 2010s, with some resurfacing in violent crimes. Because some armed services have suppressed the release of basic information, AP’s total is a certain undercount.

Government records covering the Army, Marine Corps, Navy and Air Force show pistols, machine guns, shotguns and automatic assault rifles have vanished from armories, supply warehouses, Navy warships, firing ranges and other places where they were used, stored or transported. These weapons of war disappeared because of unlocked doors, sleeping troops, a surveillance system that didn’t record, break-ins and other security lapses that, until now, have not been publicly reported.

While AP’s focus was firearms, military explosives also were lost or stolen, including armor-piercing grenades that ended up in an Atlanta backyard.

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